Thursday, September 15, 2011

To Boldly Dress

Last week marked the 45th anniversary of Star Trek and as such, last Friday night, I experienced what was undoubtedly the nerdiest evening of my entire life. To honour the occasion, a screening of The Wrath of Khan was planned, with the film projected on to a bare wall in Billy Flag and Jack Samson's Rathmines apartment, which as it happens is one of the best ways to watch a film ever. I say it was a nerdfest of an evening, but obviously that also means that it was a huge amount of fun. The main event was preceded by an episode of Deep Space 9 and an episode of the original series. The DS9 episode was one that saw the crew go back in time in order to infiltrate the Kirk-era Enterprise and featured the character of Dax giving herself a sixties Starfleet makeover in order to blend in. When she emerged in her red Mary Quant style minidress and shiny beehive, EleventyFour turned to me and said "That's going to turn up on your blog, isn't it". And GUESS WHAT….she was RIGHT! She knows me so well.

I've actually written about Star Trek once before on this blog, and have posted about sci-fi fashion over on Blaubushka, when I looked at the shiny dresses of Forbidden Planet, but this post is all about the wondrous wardrobes of the women from the original Star Trek series. For example, the most famous wearer of said red minidress, Lieutenant Uhura. There may have been a constant threat of ass cheek, but if anyone could rock it, it was she.

Anyway, the other episode we watched before KHAAAAN! was the one in which, as Jack Samson puts it, "Spock is so horny he might die". This particular episode also features the enchanting T'Pring, a Vulcan bird that Spock was betrothed to when they were both children, but in a fit of wagonry (I may have just made that word up, but you know what I mean) has decided she'd rather hook up with Kirk. All this is beside the point though, as I think my mouth fell open every time she was on screen. She's utterly GORGEOUS and sparkly and lovely and…just look at her for Jaysus sake, she's amazing. Kind of a bitch, yes, but amazing.

The hair! The clothes! The FACE!

Of course, enthralling as T'Pring and her outfit were, the series had its fair share of dodgy wardrobe choices, not least those of Andrea the Android and her criss-crossed mostly-not-there bodysuit, Shahna the stern, green haired gladiator trainer in her silver nappy and the tin-foiled state of this random blonde slave girl.

Speaking of slave girls, there were also green skinned Orion Slave Girls who appeared in the original series, all bouffant hair and looking like an alien version of Goldie Hawn when she used to appear on that 1960s sketch show. They also popped up in an episode of The Next Generation, however this time around they were updated and dropping it like it's hot as if they were the Verdigris Pussycat Dolls.

In fairness to Star Trek's costume department though, the ladies weren't always nearly naked, and oftentimes their more modest outfits were properly gorgeous, such as Dr. Miranda Jones and her cool beaded dresses (one of which was displayed in the Smithsonian as part of their Star Trek exhibit), finished off with a weird but cute topknot.

Former Catwoman Lee Merriwether also lucked out when she appeared on the show as Losira in a deadly purple cutout dress and utterly awesome eye makeup that totally reminds me of sweets from the 90s like Fruit Salads and Drumsticks.

Finally, one of my favourite Star Trek looks belongs to warrior woman Nona who, apart from being ridiculously beautiful, looked astounding in black leather, bright orange fur like she's just been Muppet-hunting and a Native American style necklace, finished off with sparkles on her face. GLORIOUS.

However, for every superb costume, there's a horrendous one too. While Nona's outfit used brightly coloured fur in a tremendous way, the following picture illustrates the exact opposite of that.